Want to speak a new language like a native? Your best bet may be to forgo classroom lessons in favour of immersion (if possible). That, at least, is the conclusion that a group of researchers from Georgetown University Medical Center came to after reviewing results from a recent study that used brai...

The Pirahã language is spoken by only about seven hundred people, members of a tribe living deep in the Amazonian jungle. However, the language has long been the focus of an ongoing academic controversy. This year, the release of a new book by Dr. Daniel Everett, one of the few outsiders who can sp...

In February, Microsoft announced that they had added Hmong to the list of languages translated by their search engine, Bing. Last week, Microsoft announced the release of a new, free online Hmong/English translator for smart phones, chats and websites. What’s with the focus on Hmong? It&#821...

Over the summer, packaged food brand Kraft announced plans to split itself up into two different companies: an American company and a global snack food division. This week, they issued a press release announcing the new name they’d chosen for the global snack food division: Mondelez Internatio...

Attempts at creating a “universal translator” are getting ever-closer to the science fiction that inspired them, as Microsoft’s latest translation demonstration makes clear. Earlier this month, the tech giant took the opportunity provided by TechFest 2012 to show off its newest inv...

Irish-speaking Tolkien fans, rejoice! A special edition of The Hobbit is due out this month — translated entirely into Irish! The Irish version of Tolkien’s classic tale is being published by Evertype Publishers, a small publishing company owned by Michael Everson which specializes in ...

An American teenager has managed to accomplish what those of us who struggled through Spanish or French can only dream of. According to the New York Times, at only 16 years old, Timothy Doner is able to communicate in at least 12 languages, including Hebrew, Russian, Italian, Persian, Swahili, Indon...

It’s St. Patrick’s Day, the one day each year that people across the world “embrace Irish culture” by wearing green and consuming copious amounts of beer laced with green food coloring. More encouragingly, however, the Washington Post notes that increasing numbers of American...

Beware of Greeks bearing passports. Until just last week, that’s the attitude that Air Lingus often displayed towards its Greek customers, especially Greek nationals flying into Ireland through Spain and Portugal. To try to catch people traveling on falsified Greek passports, Greek passengers ...

Machine translation has proven a difficult nut to crack, even for written and spoken languages. That’s even more true for sign languages, though we’ve written about some previous innovations in the field like the Fingual translation glove. However, that may be about to change. Researcher...